It’s about ticket resellers getting fined for hawking their tickets on the street, even though the practice is legal.

In a class action filed in U.S. District Court on Monday, five Detroit Lions ticket holders allege that Detroit police are unlawfully ticketing resellers, even though a federal judge struck down the city’s so-called anti-scalping law in 2006.

Under state law, it’s still illegal to resell tickets for over face value, which is known as scalping. But it’s not illegal for people to offer sporting event tickets in Detroit for less than face value, under a 2006 court ruling.

Among the plaintiffs is Southfield attorney Neal Brand, who argues Detroit police are ignoring the court ruling and forcing unwitting ticket sellers who aren’t familiar with the law into paying fines for something that’s legal.

“There’s this squad of police officers out there trying to harass people who try to resell tickets,” said Brand, who believes his class action could eventually include up to 150 plaintiffs. “There are many, many people who have pled guilty to this ... It’s a shakedown or a cash grab. How hard is it to find two ticket holders waving tickets in the air?”

The law is clear, Brand said: “You can’t get into trouble for selling tickets under face value.”

City of Detroit spokesperson John Roach said the city’s attorneys are still reviewing the complaint. At this point, he said, the city has no comment, but will file an official response to the lawsuit in court later.

According to the lawsuit, Detroit police are citing Lions ticket resellers in a roundabout way. They’re using trickery, the lawsuit states, by issuing citations to ticket resellers for not having a vendors license.

Brand, an attorney who has handled other civil rights matters, said he caught on after he was issued a citation for reselling Lions tickets last fall. According to the lawsuit, Brand was “abruptly” detained and ticketed by a police officer while he and a friend were trying to sell extra tickets to a Dec. 14 Lions game near 36th District Court. The officer took their photos with an iPad and told them to leave the corner, the lawsuit states.

When Brand tried telling the officer that they weren’t doing anything illegal and that a court ruling supported them, the officer replied: “Take it up with a judge or someone else that may care.”

Brand took it to court, arguing Detroit police are unlawfully using a law that doesn’t apply to ticket resellers, only to vendors without a license.

“In America, you can’t just use any law you want or else you could arrest anyone for anything and use inapplicable laws,” Brand said. “When a federal district judge says that it’s lawful to sell tickets for face value or less, you can’t turn around and (issue a ticket for it), that’s a trampling of your rights.”

Two other plaintiffs are Thomas Crase and Candice Walters — a father and daughter from Utah who had to fly back to Detroit in January to fight a ticket they had received outside Ford Field during a Dec. 7 game.

The Utah plaintiffs never sold their game tickets, but were ticketed because “police unreasonably suspected that they may sell them,” the lawsuit states. In the end, the father and daughter ended up paying a $220 fine and a few thousand dollars in travel costs to resolve the issue, he said.

In 2006, a federal judge declared Detroit’s law banning the resale of tickets at or below face value in front of an event’s venue as unconstitutional. While the city argued the ordinance was necessary, the judge said the city had “no explanation” for how the law helped alleviate traffic safety and security issues.

Brand said it’s time the city abide by the ruling.

“The City of Detroit has been issuing these tickets to these people who don’t have the financial means to fight back,” Brand said. “Now they got someone who is going to help them fight back.”